While vendors have been all too happy to send us larger enclosures (and we've been all too happy to receive them), our coverage of Mini-ITX and Micro-ATX cases has been a little lacking. That's why we're pleased today to present SilverStone's new Temjin TJ08-E. SilverStone's Temjin line has been a popular one, and with the TJ08-E mini tower they're confident they have a winner on their hands. It has the kind of clean exterior design we've been clamoring for more of, but can it perform?

I had a chance to take a look at the TJ08-E back at CES and fell in love with it almost immediately. While I wouldn't say I'm biased towards SilverStone, I'm definitely very fond of them. When most other vendors are reiterating and refining traditional ATX case designs, the mad scientists they call engineers seem to be constantly experimenting and tweaking, making some radical changes and some less so. The results are generally enclosures that are a bit more difficult to work with than more standardized designs, but are never dull, almost always eye-catching, and sometimes that mad science pays off.

As a mini tower the TJ08-E still feels a little bit bigger than most, though it's still not as big as Antec's P180 Mini. In some ways it's a reminder that Micro-ATX isn't that micro, but SilverStone has crammed an awful lot of expandability into this enclosure.

If you think about it, that's an awful lot of expansion space for an otherwise reasonably small mini tower. On paper at least, all I'd have to do is change out the motherboard in my video editing workstation and I could fit the entire machine, complete with all the hard drives, into the TJ08-E. As you'll see, though, something had to give to get everything inside the TJ08-E.

I've often wondered if a left hand mounted mobo would be better for passive graphics cards.. heat sink on top seems rational to me. That said, im no master of thermal and fluid dynamics, any benefit may be negligable to none. I see an experiment in my near future.Reply

Well, I"m not sure, because the fans are usually sucking air into the card - in this case they will get the air from the warmer, upper section of the board, whereas normally, the y get it from the bottom, where cooler air is supposed to be.If you"re running passive or with custom fans though, it may be beneficial. Still you have a heat source below the card, with all the VRM and CPU, so it may not be ideal.Reply

Thanks for the review, I was seriously thinking about buying this case for my build (parts just arrived today). In the end I went with the Antec Three Hundred instead, and looks like I'll be glad in terms of ease of assembly. This is a really nice looking enclosure though!Reply

Last system I built for my dad's gaming/video rig used the 300. Very spacious and easy to build with. Some sharp corners if I remember correctly, but other than that no complaints and the huge fan on the top on the low setting (fan has low/medium/high) is virtually inaudible and moves a LOT of hot air out.

Only long-term issue I can think of is dust issues inside but that's what the air compressor is for once or twice a year.

1. When photographing a black case with a black interior, illuminate it with a LOT of external light (try to minimize shadows), BEFORE pointing the camera at it. Trust me. Your photographs shows a lot of black on black, with minimal illumination, which showed much less detail than it should have, for this type of review. Remember, some of us aren't kids with sharp eyes anymore.

2. Remember to take some angled pictures of the interior of the case. Some of the best details of any case can only be discerned while looking at it from an angle OTHER than straight on. Close ups are also lacking, especially in the drive areas.

3. When reviewing a micro-atx case, doing so with a mini-itx motherboard just seems like cheating to me. You're complaining about crowding, but you really don't have a problem fitting a motherboard that small in the case. Seeing a micro-atx motherboard in there would tell a much better story, especially if you're complaining about space (or lack of).

Thanks for this review. I'll be doing a new build in the near future and am very interested in microATX or maybe even mini-ITX because I don't need that many components (no optical drive, only one HDD, SSD, and video card). The TJ08-E looks nice but the difficulty in installation kind of bothers me for something that costs that much and I'd prefer to keep my PC P&C Silencer 610W if I was using a microATX case. Can you comment on something much cheaper such as the Cooler Master Elite 341? I know the materials and maybe thermals won't be the same, but I like the size, layout, and price.Reply